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HS2 college HQ goes to Birmingham

The government is set up a national college to train up people with skills to build high-speed rail, located across two sites in Birmingham and Doncaster.

The government says it will provide specialist vocational training to the next generation of engineers working on the High Speed 2 (HS2) project and beyond.

The headquarters will be in Birmingham’s city centre science park, with a further site in Doncaster, and the college will be chaired by current Crossrail chair Terry Morgan.

The government has already announced that the construction headquarters for the £43bn HS2 rail line will be in Birmingham.

The government said up to 2,000 apprenticeship opportunities would be created by the construction of HS2, which would employ 25,000 people in total.

Business secretary Vince Cable said the opening of the college demonstrated the UK was advancing as a global leader in rail manufacturing in line with the government’s industrial strategy.

“This is the next step in building the highly skilled specialist workforce needed to develop the biggest infrastructure project this country has ever seen, and to enable our rail industry to compete in future global markets,” he said.

David Cameron said the opening of the National College would “ensure that we have a pool of locally-trained workers with the right skills to draw upon for future projects.”

Nick Baveystock director general of the Institution of Civil Engineers, welcomed the announcement, saying the college was “exactly the sort of forward thinking on our skills and capabilities that we need to see, running alongside work on the future infrastructure project pipeline.”